It will cost but a national disability insurance scheme draws closer

Earlier this month, he was named Western Australian young person of the year and most outstanding youth worker for his work as a development officer with the City of Mandurah.

It now appears he may have to give up his job because his funding for a support worker to assist him in his work for up to 30 hours each week has been cut.

At 16, Mr Darch suffered a serious spinal injury and was paralysed from the neck down.

He believes working is a key element for people with a disability who want to contribute to the community and he thinks employment services should be included in a proposed national disability insurance scheme, the NDIS.

The debate over the scheme moves to WA this week as Disability Services Ministers meet in Perth and the Productivity Commission holds a public hearing to find out what the 400,000 Western Australians with a disability want.

It is asking how the scheme should work, who should administer it, what should be included and how it should be paid for.

Peter Darch is clear on what he wants and that is to see employment services included.

"If I'm sitting at home, then I'm on a pension, I will still need a carer and support money.

"If I go to work I lose the pension, I pay $700 tax a fortnight, my carer would also be paying tax so it will not cost the government any more money for me to go to work and that doesn't take into account the physical and mental benefits of working.

"Unfortunately for me, my accident was not covered by insurance or compensation so I am at the mercy of the State.

"If I had a car accident or fallen off scaffolding at work, I would have got a compo payout."

The Productivity Commission has described the current system as underfunded, unfair, fragmented and inefficient.

Samantha Connor is a working mother from Toodyay with six children, two of whom have autism.

She has Limb-Girdle muscular dystrophy and is on the WA Ministerial Advisory Council for Disability.

She says Australia is long overdue for a national disability insurance program.

"There is an enormous disparity at the moment between who is eligible for disability support," she said.

"I have a friend who was shot in the back of the neck when he was 12, became a quadriplegic and was institutionalised at Shenton Park," she said.

"We still have people who have two showers a week because that is all the funding they can get.

"The proposed new scheme recommends doubling the funding allocated to people and the impact on families would be huge."

At what cost?

The question seems to be, where is the money going to come from?

Currently the federal government provides $1.7 billion in disability funding and the states and territories $4.5 billion.

The Productivity Commission's initial draft report recommends that the Commonwealth Government should completely fund an insurance scheme and add an extra $6.2 billion to the pot, essentially doubling it.

Its preference is that payments would be directed from consolidated revenue into a National Disability Insurance Premium Fund.

Geraldine Mellet is the WA state co-ordinator of the Every Australian Counts Campaign, which has been pushing for the adoption of a national disability insurance scheme.

She says one of the important aspects about the proposal is that the amount of money allocated will be enshrined in law, giving people certainty about their future.

"The proposal is for a quarantined pool of money, so that you are not reliant on going to the annual budget cap in hand and it will not depend on who is in government," she said.

"Basically, at the moment in Australia there are very few people with a disability who are automatically entitled to support and funding; most people think you are but it is not a system like Medicare.

"In WA, many people have to go through an application process and prove they are one of the worst cases."

The chairperson of the WA Ministerial Advisory Council on Disability, Samantha Jenkinson, agrees that the insurance system has to be federally funded.

"It is more cost efficient to have one bureaucracy than eight and no state could bring together enough funding for the proposed scheme," she said.

"Even WA with its mining revenue does not have enough money for a sustainable system, we wouldn't have the long term revenue."

Complexities

The Productivity Commission is proposing two elements to the scheme: the NDIS and the national injury insurance scheme for people who have had what is termed a 'catastrophic injury' requiring high level support.

Geraldine Mellet says New South Wales and Victoria have a no fault motor vehicle insurance scheme covering injury from car accidents but in other states and territories, it is not as comprehensive.

"The report is suggesting every State adopt a no fault scheme that would be expanded to cover all catastrophic injuries," she said.

"This would mean people who injure themselves and end up with severe disability or people born with severe disability would qualify."

The Productivity Commission will release its draft report to the Federal Government on 30 April and the final report will be delivered in July this year.

The WA Government has not yet publicly announced its position on a NDIS, stating that it cannot comment because the issue is currently before cabinet.

Samantha Jenkinson says a real fear is that the draft report and advocacy battle will lose momentum because the federal Government receives the draft report confidentially and there is no specified date for them to release it publicly.

"There are people who need help right now, they are at crisis point and they can't wait," she said.

"I think that unfortunately there will be state/federal politics that come into it but hopefully the disability sector can guilt the politicians into not playing games."

Disability advocates say a better funded, entitlement-based disability insurance system in Australia is long overdue and anything would be better than the current scheme.